


correspondence

by canniballistics



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-22
Updated: 2015-06-22
Packaged: 2018-04-02 03:59:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4045072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/canniballistics/pseuds/canniballistics
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>"Funny how the messengers always seem to come round when you're not home, messere."</i>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>---<br/> <br/>Hawke gets a letter written in familiar handwriting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	correspondence

**Author's Note:**

> takes place maybe a few months after the events of da2, in which anders lived, and in the epilogue i got isabela stayed with hawke! so that's how i've written it c: it was going to be a lot longer, i had a bunch of plans, but i need to sort them out before i do anything. there might be another chapter or two, idk. if anyone out there reads this, i hope you like it!

The envelope is small, innocuous, unassuming as it leans against his bedroll. Hawke doesn't notice it at first, too distracted with the boar he'd caught for dinner; only when Isabela strides back into the camp with two still-dripping water skins does he become aware of it. She drops the skins near the rest of their packs and comes to stand by him, leaning against a nearby tree as she crosses her arms.

"I didn't realize you could still get mail out in the wilds. Have you been writing someone?" Isabela smirks. "Updating Varric of our adventures, perhaps? I do hope you remembered to exaggerate, though I'm sure he wouldn't mind doing it for you."

"Sorry, what?" Hawke frowns as he looks at her, hands stilling while he's still elbow-deep in boar. "What are you talking about, Isabela?"

One finely curved eyebrow rises, and she motions to his bedroll. "You mean you _weren't_ expecting it?"

Hawke ignores the sarcasm almost tangibly dripping from her voice and follows her gaze. His frown turns somewhat perplexed at the sight of the envelope, and he wipes his hands on a rag before cautiously moving to pick it up. They leave faint, bloody fingerprints across the stiff paper, despite his care; Hawke pays it no mind, his eyes instead catching on the scrawling script spelling out his name. He recognizes this handwriting. He recognizes—

"Hawke? Are you all right?"

Hawke jumps as he looks up at her, startled to remember her presence. Isabela steps closer, her eyes sliding to the paper in his hands. He steps back, wanting to keep it away from her, and she purses her lips as she scowls.

"So _that's_ how it's going to be. You get mysterious mail in the middle of nowhere, and you don't share. Fine then; who's it from?"

"I'm not sure," he lies, and he knows she can tell. Isabela's far too smart for any lie of his to be convincing. Still, she doesn't press, and Hawke turns his attention back to the envelope. He's seen this handwriting more than enough times before, can still picture the hands that wrote it with startling clarity: long-fingered, gentle, with calluses on the palms. He hasn't held them in so long, and suddenly, his entire body is filled with the overwhelming desire to do so once again. Instead, he opens the envelope, drawing out the single card inside.

> _Hawke—_
> 
> _~~I'm s~~ _
> 
> _~~I lo~~ _
> 
> _I miss you._

A laugh bursts its way out of Hawke's chest, so sudden that it startles both of them. That's it? He flips the card round, trying to find more writing. _Anything_ more than that. The man had written a whole manifesto, and this is all he can manage now? A few lines of scratched out nonsense, and a single sentence? Disappointment doesn't even begin to cover it.

Hawke crushes the note in his hand without a word, tossing it and its envelope into the campfire. He watches the flames start to lick the corners of the papers for only a second before turning his back and plunging his hands back into the boar's belly. A silence settles over the camp then, broken occasionally by the fire snapping and popping. Hawke hates how acutely aware of each sharp crack he is, imagining each one destroying all trace of the letter despite his best attempts to ignore it completely.

"So. Want to talk about it?" Isabela asks idly after a few moments, though he can hear the thread of worry under her air of nonchalance. 

Hawke drops a gallbladder onto the ground, pointedly ignoring that the letter had ever existed. "Not really." 

He can hear her sighing behind him, and Isabela kicks the gallbladder into the nearby bushes as she pushes him out of the way. "You may have caught it, but there's no need to butcher the poor animal further." She strips off her gloves then, easing the knife out of Hawke's hand before adding, "We both know I'm _much_ better at handling the pointy ends of things. Why don't you go set up the roasting spit, instead?"

Hawke turns to do just that, and then stops to consider the request. "Wait, a roasting spit doesn't make much sense if it's already been gutted."

"Ah, and finally he starts thinking again." Isabela arches her eyebrows pointedly, gesturing at him with the knife. "It would have been much easier to just roast it; whose fault do you think it is that we can't?"

Cowed, Hawke turns to the fire, throwing more wood on before searching through their packs for a skillet and tripod. He doesn't realize he's started to search for any signs of the card in the fire until his eyes begin smarting, but there are no traces to find; it was only paper, of course it'd be all burned away by now. Isabela is at his side once the skillet is hot enough, dropping in thick slabs of meat and taking a seat to watch them sizzle and cook. She doesn't mention the envelope again, for which Hawke is thankful, and they eat their dinner while figuring how much farther they have yet to travel. It's a pointless discussion, just idle chatter: they have no destination, and so they could be traveling for the rest of their lives; still, it provides a distraction from the strangeness of before, and for a while, Hawke forgets all about the card. 

It doesn't last, just as all good things.

He dreams of Anders that night for the first time in weeks. It starts with his hands, watching them write, and how it had felt to clasp thin fingers between his own. Then his arms, how deceptively strong they were for how skinny they appeared. His chest, and the way it moved when he inhaled. The sound of his heartbeat. The smile on his face. How entirely he would flush red, all the way to his ears and down his chest. The expression he made when a Dalish child brought a kitten into his clinic. Hawke had wondered if it was possible to adore him more than he already did; he still doesn't have an answer, even now.

The still frames break when Anders smiles at him, kissing his forehead and murmuring, " _I love you_." A chaste kiss to his cheek, repeating " _I love you_ " against stubbled skin. He clasps Hawke's hands in his own, bending at the waist to kiss his knuckles. Again, " _I love you._ " And when he straightens, his eyes glow blue as the Chantry crumbles behind him. It's Anders' voice that speaks, even as Justice looks through his eyes, " _I will not ask your forgiveness; I know I do not deserve it. I just hope that one day, you understand._ " 

Anders moves in to embrace him, and Hawke pulls him close, eyes shut tight as he buries his face in his neck. A deep breath, trying to freeze this moment. "Why did you do it, Anders? Why couldn't you have trusted me?"

He pulls away, and after a moment his eyes are drawn to where Anders' hands are clasped around his, steadying the bloodied knife. Their eyes meet, and Anders' are brown again, no trace of the glow. He smiles, and this time it's sad as he murmurs, " _I couldn't tell Justice from Vengeance anymore._ " Anders leans in to kiss him again, and this time, Hawke tastes blood.

A hand touches his shoulder then, and Hawke jerks awake quickly, eyes wild as he and Isabela stare at each other. It takes him a long moment to remember that _this_ is real, that he'd just been dreaming, and she watches him with pursed lips the entire time. Hawke ignores it, reaching to scrub at his face and neck with a spare shirt to mop away the sweat beading his skin. It takes a moment of his refusal to respond before she sighs and shakes her head. "Stubborn," he thinks he can hear, but she's already gone to get settled on her own bedroll, arms crossed behind her head and eyes closed. And after a moment: "You talk in your sleep, you know."

Hawke's heart jumps, and he looks away, toward the woods around them. "Is that right?"

"Mm." It's her only response, and soon, her breath slows and evens as she sleeps.

A natural silence settles over the camp, nothing but crickets and the fire dying quietly. Hawke sits back against a nearby tree, sword at his side and listening intently for any sounds that might be out of place. He touches a hand to his lips, remembering the dream and how it felt to kiss Anders; the faint but still sharp tang of blood touches his tongue, and he draws his fingers away to find the tips a faint red. It sets off a panic in his chest, heart racing and looking wildly for the knife. And then he stops, takes a deep breath. Forces himself to remember that it wasn't real. _The boar_ , he has to remind himself. 

Still, he doesn't sleep for the rest of the night.


End file.
